


Five Valentine's Days Sarah Hated and One She Didn't Hate As Much

by Eustacia Vye (eustaciavye)



Category: Terminator Genisys (2015)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Canon Compliant, F/M, Implied/Referenced Sexual Harassment, Pre-Canon, Sexual Harassment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-18
Updated: 2016-02-18
Packaged: 2018-05-21 12:51:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6052282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eustaciavye/pseuds/Eustacia%20Vye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>As the title says, six different Valentine's Days in Sarah Connor's life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five Valentine's Days Sarah Hated and One She Didn't Hate As Much

**Author's Note:**

  * For [wolves_and_girls](https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolves_and_girls/gifts).



One

It was the first Valentine's Day after her parents' murder, and Pops didn't get it at all. Sarah remembered her father bringing home a dozen roses for her mother, some kind of cutesy plush toy for Sarah, his "other best girl in the world," and fancy chocolates that they would have for dessert after saying one nice thing about the other person in the family. All she had now were dim memories of those bright faces and shining emotions, especially in the dark of the ratty motel rooms that she and Pops hid out in to avoid the other Terminator.

Pops sat vigilant near the door, gun in his lap and knives strapped to his body. He let her have the lumpy bed, and kept the lights out. There wasn't even a sappy movie on the TV to keep her company, or a radio station playing love songs to lull her to sleep.

Sarah Connor was nine years old and hated love with a passion.

Two

At age twelve, Sarah was still in the awkward phase of development. She was petite with gangling limbs and precarious balance, though that meant that her self defense was even more important. Pops had her drill mercilessly on her forms, and he made sure she could knife a dummy and hit targets on the range. Sometimes she went to boxing clubs or more formal classes that Pops found, mostly so that she would know what it was like to fight against an actual opponent. There was more heft to a real body than a dummy, and she would have to contemplate reaction times and the choices that others did.

Not to mention, how to fight against someone much bigger than her.

Pops read different books on human development and childrearing, which would have been so laughable if it wasn't so sad, too. She hadn't thought it would help much, but Pops pointed out that the book had been considered an expert one since the 1940's, and in the future the author's name was still well known. Sarah had thought that the name Spock was referring to an entirely different person, but Pops wouldn't have accepted that.

She tried reading the book herself, just to see what he considered appropriate. There was quite a bit about concern for her feelings and giving her choices. That part wasn't so bad, and was probably why he asked her to pick between different options for clothes or weapons training. Just that morning, he had wanted to know if she preferred the black high top hiking boots or the combat style ones that had come from an army surplus store. She had picked the army surplus ones; they were better reinforced, would hold up longer, and easily hid the switchblade that Pops insisted she carry with her everywhere.

"Hey, baby!"

Ugh. The drunken catcall as she tried to head to the gym on time. Pops was out scouring for work, otherwise his very presence would have warded off this kind of thing. Sarah didn't even bother to turn her head, and kept right on moving.

"Hey, I'm talkin' to you!"

Sarah picked up the pace, two blocks away from the gym. The drunk that usually sat sprawled on the corner was definitely a lot more persistent than she had given him credit for, and she didn't want to think about what else he might be capable of.

"Think you're too good for me?" he snarled. "Got a better option for Valentine's, eh? Your usual sugar daddy don't know you're lookin' for someone new?"

At least his voice was farther away; he wasn't following her, not angry enough to get up and act on the anger and entitlement in his voice.

She safely got to the gym and took out her anger and helplessness on a punching bag. When Pops arrived later to pick her up, she didn't mention the incident.

The drunk wasn't on the corner the following week anyway.

Three

Fifteen and feeling rebellious, Sarah decided to smear makeup on her face like a movie star, tie back her hair, stuff her bra and hit a club with her new fake ID. Pops of course hadn't wanted to actually let her use it, but Sarah had a good argument to back it up. "How else will I know if it's as good as the forger says it is if I don't test it out? Worst thing that happens is the bouncer knows it's a fake and rips it up. If I get in, I'll dance a little. Public place, nothing bad can happen to me in there."

Pops obviously didn't believe her, because his blank expression had a serious glower to it. "I would be a poor parental substitute to allow such a thing at your age."

"I can handle myself."

"Too many unknown variables," Pops protested.

Well, at least that was an argument that Sarah could deal with. She had trained for too long to be shuffled off or have her skills dismissed. "Best way to find out what those variables are is to go in and take a look."

"I can't help you in there if you get into trouble."

"I can handle myself," Sarah repeated firmly.

He had finally relented, and she had gotten past the bouncer. The man never even looked twice at it, just thumbed her into the club. She had to resist gawking like an idiot, and tried to move like she knew what she was doing. After lingering around the edge of the room for a bit, she finally decided to go in and dance as she had told Pops she would. How often did she get a chance to dance, after all? How often could she even have a partner?

The faces of the men on the dance floor were a blur after a while. She hadn't paid any attention to the calendar, and one of the men had said there was a Valentine's special on the pink drinks. A few of them were fruity things, sweet and pleasant tasting yet still hitting her pretty damn hard; she'd had more than she should have in order to look sophisticated and not ungrateful when some of the men bought them for her.

Somehow she managed to stumble out of the club without being hassled too hard, though she staggered into the alley near the club and puked. The sweet, fruity flavor was nothing more than sour bile and acid coming back up, leaving her shaky and congested, tears in her eyes from the force of her retching.

Four

Sweet sixteen was such a stupid way to refer to that painfully gauche year. But she had an assumed name and a fake diploma to get a part time job, something to get some money coming in while Pops laid low. He had finally destroyed the liquid Terminator after them, but it left his layers of skin damaged beyond easy repair. Being a checkout girl was an easy job, at least, and it let her practice being alert. Not that she really needed much practice at that kind of thing, but Pops wanted most of these ordinary tasks to double as continued training in survival and evasion from the machines, in case others had been sent after them.

So far, so good. Cash at the end of the job, off the books even with the other name on the ID she carried. The store manager was only too happy to pay her less than minimum wage if it was in cash, and let her take on a lot of hours. He had a hard time balancing the books for the store, and using her decreased expenditures enough to help make up some of the difference.

The arrangement worked out through all of December and January, but the manager was then fired by the owner in the beginning of February. It turned out that he hadn't been actually balancing the books, more like _rebalancing_ them after embezzling some of the profits.

Sarah met with the new manager on February 13. She should have realized it was going to be a bad meeting because of several points: it was after hours, he didn't request to meet with any of the other cashiers, and it was Friday the thirteenth. She had seen the movie when it came out the year before, and it had frightened her badly. A relentless, soulless killer? Oh, yes, she knew all about those and what it was like.

He didn't want to pay her under the table anymore, unless she added "other services" to her repertoire. There was no mistaking his meaning in the way he leered at her, leaning too close into her space and all but threatening to withhold her money.

"I had a deal that worked," Sarah said.

He laid a heavy hand on her shoulder, and it not-so-subtly slid down the front of her chest. "I suggest a new deal—"

She grabbed his arm and spun around, twisting it up behind him. He struggled, and was bigger than she was, but tilting him forward and almost to the balls of his feet made his center of gravity tip too far for him to comfortably reach for her. To top it off, she popped out her switchblade and held the sharp edge against his throat. "How about we don't?" she asked coldly. Her pulse was too fast, too erratic. Stupid adrenaline.

It wasn't even worth it to file a complaint or demand more than the evening's wages. And if he tried to track her down through the contact information on file, every bit of it was fake.

Five

Feeling hardened and streetwise at the ripe old age of eighteen, Sarah hated everything about every holiday except Halloween and Christmas. Halloween could be frightening, but it was also a wonderful excuse for Pops to tag along everywhere even if he was badly injured. People just thought he was a makeup artist for a movie studio putting their costumes to shame. Sarah loved being able to be somebody else, anybody else, for a little while. Being herself was downright awful sometimes, and she was feeling antsy. Another year and Kyle Reese would arrive, and they would have to stop the other Terminator that wanted to kill her, as well as make sure that Kyle fathered the future leader of the Resistance.

No pressure, right?

But this year was a little different. She had gotten to know a couple mechanics at the shop down the street from the hole in the wall dump she and Pops were living in. Pops was currently doing construction work, and without much else to do, Sarah spent time at the shop. She picked up a few things here and there, and liked hanging out with Steve and Sam. They were covered in tattoos, told ribald jokes and didn't think there was anything wrong with cracking open a beer before noon. They never asked her age or if she was legal to drink, but let her take one from the cooler to sip at while helping them with cars and bikes, learning how engines were put together and how machines worked.

Steve's nephew Drake was an idiot, getting involved in drag racing, but he was fun to talk to when he hung out at the shop. He was pretty easy on the eyes, too, and loved the fact that he could talk about cars and she could have a conversation back. Sarah supposed that he could be counted as a boyfriend; Steve certainly hoped so, at any rate.

Twenty-three and secure in his successes on the street circuit, he had Sarah tag along on one of the races. "Easy money," he assured her. "I'll win a few hundred, get you a fancy-schmancy dinner at one of those classy places for Valentine's Day."

"I don't need a fancy place," she had protested.

"Need? No. But want? Why not? It'll be fun, I promise."

She never got the chance to find out.

Drake had been in competition with a number of other racers, but had badly beaten Randy in front of his girlfriend Pepper at the prior one. Unbeknownst to the group of racers, Randy took it personally, and wasn't content to try to earn his way back into the top ten tier. He surreptitiously damaged Drake's car and tires, and the rapid speed caused the tires to blow. As good a driver as he was, Drake lost control of his car and crashed. He died instantly.

The next few weeks were a blur, something with a wake and a funeral and Steve watching over her pretty closely. Sam realized she was numb, that this was grief. But that was stupid, because she didn't really love Drake. He was stupid and reckless and sweet and loyal and completely and utterly _stupid_ and _pointless—_

Sarah was only too glad to move again, waiting for Kyle Reese to show up.

And One More

Sarah Connor was nineteen and helped to save the world, even though no one knew it.

Now that her purpose was fulfilled, she actually didn't know what else to do. She'd never planned for that, though she had planned every moment up until the arrival of the murderous Terminator in 1984. She certainly never planned to be catapulted farther into the future, into a place that was nearly unrecognizable. She hadn't expected to have to kill John Connor, or that she actually liked Kyle Reese more than a little bit.

He was just as lost as she was, not that it made her feel any better.

They got documentation and new ID's for the identities they would assume. She did long hours in a factory on an assembly line, and Kyle worked in a garage. It reminded her briefly of Drake from the year before, though Kyle was not nearly as stupid or reckless. Well, okay, he was, but not in the same way as Drake. He looked after her however he could, checking for her safety ahead of his own. That was annoying and endearing at once, and she didn't quite know how to handle it. He read books by the truckful, practically, scouring the internet and the library once Pops introduced him to it. Sarah didn't quite care about all that, but gamely read the things that Kyle found interesting and pointed out to her.

Perhaps that was why it floored her when he started making Actual Food for dinner. With flowers in a vase and candles lit. Silverware laid out as if they were sitting in a fancy restaurant, kind of like those shows on TV that she had seen. Kyle had found some matching china somewhere, the expensive kind that people put on their wedding registries, casually elegant with a swirling design on the outer edges in silver. The glasses were likely crystal, then, because they had a lot of cut facets and twinkled in the candlelight. There was a card near her plate, and a small box with chocolates in it.

Something inside her chest _hurt._

Kyle looked at her with a gentle smile on his face, extending his hand toward her. She had something of a goofy grin on her face in answer as she took it. Here was something she could have, maybe. He didn't care if she had grit under her fingernails or grease stains on her clothes, hair pulled loose from her ponytail. She didn't care if he had similar grime from the day on him, if he shook at the sound of a train rumbling past, if airports made him nervous. They were the only ones able to understand this entire screwed up situation, and he was genuinely kind to her. Maybe he had an idealized version of her in his head, she still wasn't sure if he did or didn't, but he went out of his way to comfort her and made her his priority.

It was nice. It was better than nice. Pops had prioritized her physical well-being as she grew up, but hadn't understood the emotional side of things. Kyle did, and knew how important it was to give the illusion of stability even if it was impossible to achieve.

He tucked her seat in gallantly, and poured her wine and then his. It was the five dollar cheap brand at the corner liquor store, but it looked just as good as any fancy brand on TV shows in the crystal glass. The food had been plated in such a pretty and decorative manner, it didn't even matter to her what it would taste like. The apartment was small and messy, belongings strewn all about in haste and efforts to hide weaponry they likely didn't still need. It wasn't a romantic kind of setting, but the table was. Kyle put all this effort into this one meal, this one moment, just to try to bring her a measure of happiness.

Sarah knew he expected nothing in return, but the shell she tried to keep up cracked just a little bit more. Kyle deserved better than he'd gotten, and she was determined that he would get it.

"To our future together," he said when he lifted his glass in a toast.

She smiled at him and lifted her glass in return. "To our future. It's going to be wonderful together," she promised, meaning every word.

The End


End file.
